PolecatEZ

It still works on about 95% of the parts. I highly recommend using the Active texture reduction mod instead, as it does the exact same thing but in a more dynamic fashion. The only advantage this would have is reduced load times for the first run of the mod, after the second or subsequent times you run the game, active texture reduction mod is a clearly better choice.

Right click on the command pod on the new vessel and tell it "control from here". I had the same issue where Mechjeb wouldn't conduct any execution commands. When I manually told the new command pod that it was in control, everything started working. I found a minor bug also, with an easy workaround, but when you load up a Kerbal to command the newly minted vessel there's no IVA for him. After releasing from the clamp, you then EVA and IVA again and its fixed. I'm also getting a very explody everything if I'm not at 1x warp right AND present right when the ship finishes. I'll hunt for a way to disable progressive building until its stable.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/71241-Sensors-pack-1-%28for-modders-ONLY%29?highlight=license Its an AWACS and a radar-looking scanner, both of which could probably just be re-colored to match the schema you're working out.

Any chance of getting with the other guy that just did the new radar/scanners in the add-on development thread? Now all we need is a new smelter and part press and we're in business.

A minor tweak for the proletariat, if you could add the tech tree designators into the config so we can have them in career mode. Otherwise, these look fantabulous.

Pure stock I've done 7 orange tanks with the Mammoth series, but there have been a lot of stability improvements to the game since then. A lot more should be do-able. The trick is to get something that doesn't just look like a giant bundled block to launch the tanks.

Steam tells me almost 1400 hours.

Unless the file structure changes for gamedata/squad, this pack won't go out of date until someone comes up with a better way to reduce texture sizes. I see there has been some progress on that front, but I'm not sure if it does the same thing. This pack should work as normal, at about 99% of the efficiency as before. Leaving the hi-rez textures for just the new parts won't kill your system.

It doesn't do that at all, its just a straight size reduction of the .png files. No channels were harmed in the making of the redux pack. There are some artifacts with the intakes that I've noticed, but other than that I haven't seen any other issues. Cockpit details were left alone as well, just some of the individual props were shrunk.

There are plenty that have reverted to or have an open license. My own opinion on the matter is that free is free, and I follow Squad's example for this. If money isn't involved, "controls" and "permission" doesn't make a lot of sense. You won't convince me that the community benefits or creativity is enhanced when you restrict anyone's freedom to create as a general principle. Squad sells their initial software at a reasonable price because their developers because engines cost money, servers need maintained, and full-time developers need to eat. I've actually purchased 7 copies happily. The assets for the game, however, are free as free. You can check out questioncopyright.org for position papers and history of copyright if you're really interested in this subject. CC 3.0 SA is a very big step in the right direction. I will support it any way I can. There are a number of mods that are free to use as a basis for creating other works, forks, derivations, etc, with proper credit to the author and Spaceport hosting as the lowest common stipulations (GPL 3 or CC3.0 SA), including KW, RemoteTech, Lionhead Aerospace, Ferram Aerospace, KSP Interstellar, NovaPunch, B9 Aerospace, FusTek Expansion, ISA Mapsat, MechJeb 1 and 2, Mod Admin, FireSpitter (parts only, nd for plugin), KOS scripting, Hyperedit, AEIS Rocketry, KAS (plugin sourcecode only), Wolf Pack, Spherical Tanks, Damned/Infernal Robotics, my own stuff and quite a few others. Always check out specific licenses for details. Please support these modders by downloading their stuff so they get the "bump" effect, and also by not abusing too badly the freedom they gave you to deconstruct, supplement, and recycle their stuff. I highly recommend trying to work with the author first, not out of "permissions" sake, but so you aren't just doing a worse version of what they already plan, for example. Since its still necessary to credit the creators, I don't see any need for a modder to worry about someone wholly stealing his stuff and just reposting it. There are more that could/would be free if their developers had thought to put a license, as the "default" is max copyright. A few vocal modders don't wish to share their toys openly, and that's fine, but I won't support them any further than already promised - and as you can see from the list above, they are hardly "most modders." This is my own policy, full debates have been done elsewhere (here) and probably won't serve much purpose if repeated. If other modders wish, a better place to post their own positions on this subject is probably in their own respective threads. It can but it isn't a huge priority. The main reason Novapunch is so big is because it has a lot of parts, the textures are fairly efficient for most parts already. If you want to reduce the load of NP, I suggest just deleting out unused parts or redundant parts from other packs (such as adapters, fairings, some engines, some fuel tanks, etc). I personally like the nice mix of KW, Firespitter, and AIES, with just a few supplemental parts from NovaPunch. I would love to see someone do a texture pack so I could get a unified look, however, possibly using the B9 textures as a basis so my whole space program looks consistent. To each his own.

This was my first bug right out of the gate. Jeb hit the mine and actually lived while swimming to get in the seat, but it blew all the little parts off the sub. 5 seconds later the game crashed to desktop.

I'm not sure how reducing the textures did that for you, unless you can play with a higher resolution overall now. BobCat needs to license his shiznit one way or another before I can think about it. Even with that, the American pack is already in good shape I think, the textures seem fairly efficient already and shrinking a few of them won't give that much advantage overall. The Soviet pack could definitely use some work, but they're in .mbm, which means an awkward installer and a lot of effort. After Kethane, I won't be touching anything without an open SA clause on the license, even with permission. There's still lots I want to do, like to start an online resource center for beginning modders, I'm just knee-deep in mid-term finals right now.

After telling it the proper parameters PS will tell me the file size is wrong for the resoution. If I set it to a single channel, it will finally produce an image, but its basically garbage (offset shadows of the original image, in different colors). There doesn't seem to be a way to force PS to open the image with the settings I input, it insists that its the wrong file size/dimensions/channels regardless of what combination is put in. I'll get a screenshot up of what I'm talking about in a few.

I'm a little busy now with other things, but in the .22 re-release I'll be taking another look at alpha channels. As well, I cracked the code on a few other file sizes so the overall savings will break even, but with a much better look. I also have the Kethane textures *mostly* done, but will also hold off until Majiir releases his next update so installation will be a lot easier. I think the plan is for him to use full-sized .tga's on his next release and then I'll put out the lower rez version. I just couldn't get the .raw method to work reliably unfortunately, maybe it worked 1 in 5 or 6 times, and then not that well.

Those look like simple resizes, should be easy enough to re-make, improve, and release. Might also want to look at module manager so you don't need to copy too many assets.

Don't let that discourage you if you see a need. Try using the stock girders and i-beams and use the MODEL command in .cfg files to make them do what you want. You can use my stuff in "Restock" as a basis. Not everyone is good with Unity, but you can still do good things for the community.

I respect that fact that art appreciation is very subjective. As for the patent office, the onus is on them to make decisions about just what degree of innovation has taken place. Having an inventor shout "I iz creativ!" will not guarantee him a patent for anything. This process is very arbitrary, and patent clerks actually need a post-grad degree and pass some kind of grueling certification in order to qualify to make those calls. That was never in doubt, but the romantic notion that creativity strikes from the heavens isn't accurate. The Sternberg approach to creativity is what I taught when I did game design seminars and round tables, whereby I tailored it to suit game design. Its probably the most accepted definition and description of the general process, and you will note that it has little to do with the magical concepts of innovation and originality. Dumbed-down versions of Sternberg's theories can be found in almost every basic game design textbook. I don't expect you to actually read, but it would be great if you understood that divine inspiration only happens in the movies and that real creativity involves using knowledge and background to coalesce into something that pushes a field forward. Its a very organic process, evolutionary, derivative. Note that I wasn't talking about your definition or my definition of best. I was talking about the pecking chicken they hired at the sweatshop to select songs they thought were cool and bundle them as "Best of..." or "Greatest Hits of..." albums. Regular people then purchase these albums out of convenience, and if there were no market, they wouldn't continue this practice. I can admit to owning a few myself, and I think they're just peachy. So why couldn't some enterprising individual make a greatest hits parts pack and distribute it - without being beaten up by the "real modders"? This was just an example, I'm sure there are other meta-mods that can be made. Texture packs that seamlessly blend the looks of two different mods...like space-age aircraft carriers (B9 textures over BoatsR3 parts), or an entire texture pack that gives Kosmos black shading to Novapunch Parts. Why couldn't dead mods, which are still requested, be revived when all that is needed is a simple .cfg tweak? (this is a philosophical, not a legal question, btw) So from scratch they invented their own programming language to articulate what the mod would do? There were no code samples, hook documentation, libraries to borrow from, tutorials, college classes taken in programming, long hours dissecting the work of others...and that's just direct attributions to the work they do, we can't even begin to give credit to their environmental circumstances, outside of their control, that conspired to give them the perfect storm of a programming machine. The genetics and parenting that helped them hone their mathematical ability. The good public schools which some of us paid taxes for to help their skills. The collective knowledge and expertise of tens of thousands of programmers and mathematicians that came before them that contribute to their knowledge...or at least lies at their fingertips. Thousands of hours of playing other games and watching inspirational movies that gave them a solid foundation for knowing what to create.Nothing is created in a vacuum. Everything is derivative. Seriously, you mentioned those who made "nothing more than config hacks." A few of us here do indeed fall into that category, so yes, you were addressing a categorical group to which I am a part. I honestly can't tell if you're trolling now. And yes, all we want is just to steal your stuff and destroy the community, and burn down something or something, but we're lazy so we'll get to it later. Boogedy, boogedy. Happy? I think I'm finally done, for reals this time. I'll be handing out grades for this debate at the end of the semester. If you want to address any point of mine, send me a PM please.

The idea was that the underpinning argument is basically "Open licenses only lead to bad things (variously called "disasters", "hacks", etc)" Creative use of an open license can indeed improve the community, and my own little "thing" (hesitant to call it a mod) has proven this, or at least disproved the above theory. Another argument is that open licenses creates lazy or morally bad people, or that everyone that wants to contribute must necessarily "skill up". I would argue against this as well, everyone should devote as much time as they like to improving the body of work created for this game. If there is ample opportunity presented to do so, and the niche is not being filled, the ecological vacuum should be plugged for the health of the system, until something better comes along. Most of these little odd jobs don't require massively skilled labor, just creative use of existing tools and parts. I haven't yet seen any other compelling argument other than the straw man you present in the last paragraph. I'm sure Squad would enforce blatant acts of outright theft without serious improvement, on a case by case basis. I would argue it would be easier to police these extreme(ly rare) acts than enforce a patchwork of licenses and non-licenses. As well, attribution would not be stripped from an open modding policy, so borrowed work would still belong somewhat to the original author. Particularly bad borrowed works would be subject to market forces and disappear quickly, unless it stars Leonardo DiCaprio and then the human race is stuck watching it in high school for millennia to come. If these market forces don't materialize, the community can create standards or a vote system or the like, with voluntary participation. The last argument is most troubling, which is "Squad wouldn't do that (open license enforcement) because we would all take our toys and leave just the crappy mods behind." - Ayn Rand would have a warm fuzzy about this, if she wasn't such a heartless sociopath. It implies that the mod creators aren't confident in their superiority and hold some kind of fear someone could, indeed, improve upon their work - thus somehow robbing them of...something intangible. Having someone do worse using their work as a basis would cost them nothing and only elevate their esteem. Regardless, it inserts a very emotional stake on things that leads to irrational actors in the system. You've seen a few cringeworthy responses from your own side, I'm sure. To me its like poking a Tea Partier until a racist pops out. Please don't give me any more cheap target practice, I really feel like I'm spawn camping with the Apache in BF2 now.

I agree, some of them were pretty bad. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_William_Shakespeare_screen_adaptations http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Re_Imagined_Text.html?id=x4C7JqgDltAC http://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/shakespeare-adaptations Seriously, does nobody else Google before they construct an argument? The money shot though is that William Shakespeare himself ripped off completely other notable works of his day, put his name on them with some very minor tweaks, and released them. Darn the fact that pesky CC-XX-ND 3.0 laws wouldn't be around for another 400+ years - the world would have been spared the scourge of Shakespearean drama. Everything is derivative. Even the pixels. Next thing you're going to tell me is that the Bible wasn't derivative and that nobody changed a few words and released it... I know I promised, but don't offer such low-hanging fruit. It makes for a sentence with a noun and a verb, but otherwise lacks a coherent thought. Progress happens through evolutionary process, in which minor changes nudge things forward. This can be rapid or slow, or even stagnant, but it does eventually budge. The patent office exists for money, where I said that copyright arguments make the most sense. If there were no profit motive, there would be no patent office. Since here there is no profit motive, I question why copyright is necessary. Why buy a "Best of" collection album when you could buy all the albums and cherry pick your favorite songs? Its convenient. You could make the argument that people should listen to music and spend countless hours weeding their collections themselves, but some people just want to jump right in and enjoy some tunes based on someone else's arbitrary preferences. If someone were to release a pared down parts pack, I know I would certainly use it.****if any aspiring hacks or cannibals want to do this for the community, I'll send you my list of all useful mods with open licenses to help you get started**** Are you saying that mining resources in a space exploration game is an original concept? Or having a winch? Or robotic parts? I would say these things are quite an obvious progression in a game such as this, and that their creators happened to be the first (or second, or third) with the ability to develop these ideas and win in the war of ideas. Their copyright was irrelevant to their success in this. The last part sounds dangerously like elitism or a personal attack...somehow people that voluntarily choose to contribute to this game should be somehow discriminated against based on their skill levels coming into this. So are parts creators and programmers better people than those that find other useful niches and fill them, cannibals and hacks? Am I somehow receiving the same retirement benefits as you for doing less work? I digress.

You pretty much just dismissed the entire body of human scientific, technological, and yes, even artistic achievement. EVERYTHING is derivative, its just a question of degree. Scientific progress, for example, is very closely derivative. Even the scientists we think as "great" all whole-heartedly "stole" the work of their predecessors, even sparking a few cat fights which did benefit humanity when the smoke cleared. In science today though, there are many cases of potentially lifesaving achievements locked away due to patent and copyright protection. Tracing the lineage of an idea or an art form is quite a fun topic. In literature, for example, all valid plot types were exhausted by the Greeks 2500 years ago, everything since then is "derivative" crap. Copyright itself is a relatively new legal construct and cultural concept. Lots of stuff in that link, if you're interested. And good on them. Why do we need 12 parts packs which have at least half their content as exact replicas of another pack? Why do the creators here need to reinvent the wheel every time, whether they can do it or not, when a simple texture change or part re-size will work perfectly? Why would a designer of a mod who sees everything he needs spread across 4 other plugins need to learn coding from zero just to do the same thing? There was quite a famous case of a "libertarian" that did hold this view. Nearly every sensible argument regarding protection of artistic or intellectual property involves a right to make a profit. If you remove profit from the equation, it makes even less sense. This last link is one I read maybe 4 years ago while researching something else, but keeping those ideas have shaded my opinion since then: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/07/opinion/07iht-edsmiers.html?pagewanted=all I think I've exhausted all energy I care to put in this fight, as it seems like I'm talking right past people with TLDR bs, cheers guys. All the links in this thread are for those interested in another point of view on the subject, I don't think I could improve on any of these ideas any more.

I'll give it a whirl, I was using custom header's excised from .tga and .mbm files for each scenario (size and alpha channel), pasted in with a hex editor. We'll see if this works.

Working on a way to cleanly get .tga textures to return neatly into .mbm after resizing. This should solve any issues with the wonky installer batch file, then I can just do clean overwrites. So far, not much success but I'm getting closer with each try...you can blame InfiniteDice and his new submarine parts for further delays on my part, I shall be chilling on the ocean floor for a bit.

Whatever it it takes dude...though I don't think I have the Oscar around here in the bag quite yet, lots of competition. Kethane it is for the next pack, how could I say no to such sweepingly generous offer?

That's 3 different factors - 1 - B9 parts are in .png format, which are compressed on your hard drive but have little or no savings on your RAM load. These textures are re-inflated to a size commensurate with their textures squared. For example, a 1024x1024 230kb .png and a 1024x1024 4mb .mbm are seen as the same size by the KSP program when playing, both will use 4MB of RAM (give or take depending on other factors). The size you see in the folder on your hard drive may or may not have any bearing on how many resources the mod takes. Generally it doesn't. 2 - Kethane, like many mods and models, uses freshly Unity dumped ,mbm files. This is ok in some cases, but Unity really likes to make mountains out of mole-hills in most cases. Normal maps often don't need to be near the resolution of the texture they're enhancing, but they use the exact same amount of resources as a 1024x1024 texture like in the example above. With very flat colors on the textures (monocolor schemes, for example), this level of detail can be dumped easily in favor of performance for those that desire it. Dropping just one level down, say 1024 to 512, often doesn't have any impact on visuals, but it cuts RAM usage by 75%. Another 5% can be saved by removing unnecessary channels if they can be pared without killing the texture entirely. 3 - The B9 creator also went to great pains to consolidate his parts using the MODEL command set, which means that sometimes 3 or 4 parts share the exact same textures, basically giving you "free parts" in some cases, and certainly impacting your hard drive space.

I would prefer not to deal with the Kethane creator myself due to philosophical differences, but you may ask him. Full context here. Bottom line, his toys, his license, his job to debloat it if he feels it needs it. I love you all, but I can't do Kethane for you, sorry.